1. Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns a man-machine interface device for telephone terminals.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In addition to communication means enabling the user to communicate using the terminal, a telephone terminal usually includes a man-machine interface including means enabling the user to enter terminal control data, including a keypad for entering the numbers needed to set up calls.
Control data can also be entered during a call accessing certain services, for example services using servers supplying pre-recorded spoken information, in response to various options proposed to the user when accessing such services.
Entering such control data by means of the keys of the dialing keypad to command the generation of multifrequency signals is known in itself, the correspondence between the various options proposed and these various keys being indicated in a help message transmitted to the user in text or voice form.
This procedure has the drawback of being less than optimal since listening to or reading such help messages is irksome to the user, wastes a great deal of time and introduces an additional level of complexity for the user, namely the necessity to establish a correspondence between an option to be selected and a dialing key to be pressed.
Avoiding such drawbacks by providing the terminal with dedicated keys, also known as "soft keys", and selecting an option by pressing the key next to a text corresponding to that option displayed on the screen are also known in themselves.
One such solution is described in "ADSI: A new age of interactive services" by J. Brad Johns, 7th World Telecommunication Forum, Telecom 95 Geneva, vol. 1, pp 405-408.
However, in this solution the mode of presentation of said options to the user is determined at the remote terminal equipment (server or central office) rather than in the terminal itself.
Accordingly, in both these prior art solutions the mode of presentation of said options to the user is determined at the remote terminal equipment, the essential disadvantage of which is that no difference of mode of presentation is allowed from one terminal to another. Depending on the ergonomic features of the terminal, or merely the preferences of the user, one mode of presentation may be found to be more suitable than another, for greater user friendliness.
An aim of the present invention is to avoid the above drawbacks.